Enforced Cold War: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

* In ''[[To LOVE-Ru]]'', Rito is forced to go to school with Yami, the infamous alien assasin known throughout the galaxy who wants to kill Rito, but doesn't because she's best friends with his sister. She will however try if he does anything ecchi towards her [[Accidental Pervert|which has Rito narrowly escaping death on a daily basis]]

* In ''[[Last Exile]]'', the countries of Anatoray and Disith are engaged in a long and bloody war under the supervision of the mysterious Guild, which directs the official battles which take place in the air between the country's respective air forces. The enforcement comes into play when one side gains too much of an advantage and is stopped forcefully by the forces of the Guild, in order to maintain the [[Status Quo Is God|status quo]].

* In the ''[[Ah! My Goddess]]'' universe, actual battle between the gods and demons is prevented by the Doublet System. Kill someone from either side and someone else from the opposite side would literally drop dead on the spot. As no one (save one notable exception) knows who their doublet is, this prevents the saner ones from simply starting Ragnarok early. For the insane ones there's always the direct intervention of the Daimakaichou or the Almighty.

* ''[[One Piece]]'': {{spoiler|The Whitebeard War ends this way, as Shanks intervenes and threatens to take on any side if they don't stop the senseless violence. In this case, this is likely a short-term solution, as Shanks and his crew are about equal in power to the other factions. The only reason Shanks' threat held weight is because all the factions (Luffy's allies, The Whitebeard Pirates, the Blackbeard Pirates, and the World Government) were too weakened from the fighting up till that point.}}

 

* The planets Apokalips and New Genesis in [[The DCU]]. The first issues of ''[[New Gods]]'' and ''Mister Miracle'' explained the peace treaty between them, which additionally resulted in the characters of Orion and Mister Miracle.

 

== Fan Works ==

* In fandoms where [[Ship-to-Ship Combat]] is prevalent, many of the major message boards have rules against flaming other members or ships, preventing the ship wars from becoming too terribly violent. The major ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'' boards in particular are known to clamp down heavily hard on flame wars between Kataang and Zutara shippers.

 

== Literature ==

** Comes out in full force around Quidditch matches, where Gryffindors and Slytherins usually end up in the hospital wing with antlers and leaks in their body. During the fifth book Harry had to walk with a protective guard of Gryffindors because the Slytherins kept trying to sabotage him.

* The treaty between Watches in the ''[[Night Watch]]'' 'verse, which is openly inspired (bordering on the [[Anvilicious]] actually) by the actual Cold War. Add two millennia-old [[The Chessmaster|Chessmasters]] with magic powers enough to make the most absurd [[Gambit Roulette]] seem timid. {{spoiler|The Inquisition is the higher power here.}}

 

== Live Action TV ==

* ''[[Star Trek]]'':

** The Organian Peace Treaty, forced on the Federation and the Klingons by [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien]]s who found war in their backyard distasteful. This lead to a series of more direct Cold War metaphors, such as both sides intervening in a border planet's war.

 

== Tabletop Games ==

** Most drow lives like that, in the framework of [[Evil Matriarch|Lolth]] [[Religion of Evil|theocracy]]: otherwise infighting turns into [[Ax Crazy]] all-out war and then genocide—and [[Gods Need Prayer Badly|she needs them alive]].

** In ''[[Forgotten Realms]]'' setting: enforced in the House wars of Menzoberranzan: espionage, conspiracy and secret raids against rival houses are permitted, even encouraged, but woe be to those who get caught. Failures to enforce it caused whole cities to be utterly destroyed (Golothaer, [http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Great_Bhaerynden Bhaerynden aka Telantiwar] aka ''Great Rift''), ruined and taken by external force ([http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Insurrection Ched Nasad]) or weakened and massacred by neighbours ([http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Maerimydra Maerimydra]). Menzoberranzan barely escaped the same fate ''twice'' during Silence of Lolth (seven months) alone. And Baenre rule Menzoberranzan because it was their matron who said "stop the madness" when all-out fight began, Menzoberra was killed and the cavern itself seriously reshaped. They are ''that'' aggressive.

 

== Theatre ==

* [[Older Than Steam]]: ''[[Romeo and Juliet]]'' is, [[Zeroth Law|of course]], the Ur-Example.

 

== Video Games ==

* An interesting variant shows up in ''[[Knights of the Old Republic]]'': the Republic and the Sith are very much openly at war with each other, but both sides are dependent on trade with the neutral planet of Manaan, which supplies a unique and very valuable mineral used in medical supplies that neither army can do without. Thus, both the Republic and the Sith maintain a military presence and an embassy on Manaan, but have to avoid direct conflict lest the government cut off trade with the aggressor, and many of the quests on the planet are outright illegal acts of espionage against the Sith.

 

== Web Comics ==

 

== Web Original ==

* In the late second season of ''[[WITCH (animation)|WITCH]]'', the heroines are unable to defeat [[Big Bad]] Nerissa because she possesses the Heart of Meridian. Only two people can take it from her, and one of them is imprisoned inside of it. The other? {{spoiler|Season one [[Big Bad]] Phobos, whom the girls must free from imprisonment so he can take the Heart from Nerissa.}} They disguise him as a student at their school, and for a brief time, [[Hilarity Ensues]] as [[Fish Out of Water]] {{spoiler|Phobos}} stumbles through the trials and tribulations of high-school life. However, {{spoiler|the alliance lasts all of one and a half episodes, as Phobos decides to screw over the heroines once getting the Heart away from Nerissa.}}

* In the third season of ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'', The [[Weird Trade Union|Guild of Calamitous Intent]] forces [[Affably Evil]] supervillain The Monarch to give up Dr. Venture as his arch-nemesis and find somebody else to antagonize. He doesn't take it well.

 

== Real Life ==

** Note however that claims of this sort of thing are generally ''very'' contentious and heavily laced with [[Unfortunate Implications]]. Anthropology has a lot of variant mileage.

* Arguably, the ''original'' Cold War was enforced as well, not by God or [[Sufficiently Advanced Aliens]] but by fear of the consequences -best-case scenario was a bodycount to rival the First World War, worst-case was the end of human civilisation - if it went hot.